I was at the meeting and it was a nothing burger in terms of any new information. Perhaps the worst LUK meeting I have ever attended in terms of Q&A...Yet the highest turn out in terms of shares voted in favor of the name change, etc.
This was not the only paradox
They are trying to simplify the LUK/JEF story and get analyst coverage, which is good. There are lots of good things happening which have all been previously disclosed. The irony is that they still have the meeting in a basement with no web cast or transcript...Where they talk about getting more coverage. This is my main bitch.
Handler mentioned that Joe and Ian were/are legends, which is true. Brian chimed in that value has way under performed growth and that is part of the reason they lag in share price. They are all frustrated with the share price and that is why they have taken to buying in the stock now that they have excess liquidity and are ready for the next down turn in that sense.
The real reason the stock under performs in my view is that they are NOT Joe and Ian even though they have done a very good job with the hand they were dealt....So they can't get away with doing the bare minimum of being a public company and get a decent share price. Joe and Ian could get away with that.... ( Meaning no quarterly calls, AM in a basement, one investor day per year in spite of having a very complicated story) The real frustration for me is that they are in the business of employing analysts, raising capital, underwriting securities, etc....Surely they do not need the likes of me to tell them this.
My thesis is that they need to become more "promotional" in their view...which I would call more traditional.... and highlight the good things they have accomplished and I believe they will. It shouldn't be trading where it is and they are need to change that by owning the fact that they need to behave more closely to their peers in terms of investor relations.
The fundamentals of why I think its undervalues have all been discussed here so I'm not going to repost any of that. Cheers!